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Samizdata quote of the day We seem to have become practically as theocentric at the higher levels of the administration as these people we’re waging war against. It makes me kind of uncomfortable.
– Christopher Buckley, interviewed in the Sunday Times Magazine
He’s talking about the US; but there are some discomfortingly morally aggressive Christians in charge on this side of the pond, too.
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So, the Bush administration is as “theocratic” as whom? The Iranians? Mandatory veils in DC? The Taliban? Shooting adultresses in football stadiums? The Saudis? Not letting women drive? Al Qaeda? Beheading captives as a publicity stunt?
Sorry, no. Buckley is trying to suck up to his British hosts, I imagine to better sell some book he has for sale.
The Bush administration has people in it who believe in and practice a Protestant variant of Christianity. This is the historical norm in the USA.
No theocracy going on at all.
The idea that there is some practical or moral equivalence between American Christians who exercise their rights as citizens to participate in politics and the terrorists of fundamentalis Islam is a groundless slander that is far beneath the usual quality of what one reads on Samizdata.
Shame.
That’s funny. I can’t think of any more godless age than the one we’re in…on either side of the pond, unless you count the deification of self.
I think we should have a registrar of members interests for ‘beliefs’, where they apply.
I can’t imagine that would be too popular with our servants and representatives, so it would probably have to be something done by an interest group.
I’m with Lex. This is a slander, not an argument, and certainly not any kind of insightful commentary.
The remark was “theocentric” not theocratic.
A comment I read sometime ago, and which has stuck in my mind –
“Christian fundamentalists believe in the Garden of Eden, Muslim fundamentalists fly planes into buildings. There is a difference.”
Politicians, like all people, have beliefs, and that provides the basis for their decisions. I judge the politicians by their decisions, their beliefs are irrelevant to my life.
Who cares whether this administration is theocentric or not?
Would you care to speculate on the contribution of ‘theocentrics’ to civilisation? You might like to devote a section to a comparative analysis of atheists.
I’m not exactly religious myself, but my infallible reaction to a comment like that is to identify the speaker as an utter fool. After all as Lex and Chris in particular make clear, there is no rational basis whatsoever for such a statement. There is, of course, pure bigotry….
I’d hate to think that of you.
Politicians, like all people, have beliefs, and that provides the basis for their decisions. I judge the politicians by their decisions, their beliefs are irrelevant to my life.
Who cares whether this administration is theocentric or not?
People care if those decisions effect their lives on such issues as stem-cells, abortion, gay marriage and Iintelligent Design.
Religious beliefs on things like these should not be forced upon individuals by their government – however that government was arrived at.
I must confess a degree of simple bigotry on my part. When I hear GWB or any politician talk about god, I feel waves of loathing for them surge through me. I have to actively resist Bush Derangement Syndrome.
I think this is because it terrifies me that a person with power over me (not to mention access to nuclear weapons) believes in something I regard as a delusional fantasy.
That said, I feel much the same way about socialists.
Piggy Bank:
Given the track record of avowedly atheistic regimes, I think I’m sanguine about the situation here.
Given the reality of the situation, I think your terror should probably be downgraded to mild annoyance, if at all possible.
Who is Christopher Buckley, and why should I pay attention to what he says?
rosignol – not to put words in Guy Herbert’s mouth, I think the point of this is that you shouldn’t.
Oh, and he’s a “famous person.” Actually, he’s a “political novelist,” but he’s mainly “famous because he’s famous.” A Commentator, if you will (unlike we mere commentors).
Who is Christopher Buckley,
William F. Buckley’s son and another sorry example of the degradation of the American upper classes. Really, they need to get out more. Somedays I feel we need a revolution in the French mode so we can send these guys to the guillotine and start fresh. Just like the Bourbons, they are.
Merovign,
No; I didn’t mean you shouldn’t pay attention to him, or I would not have endorsed his sentiments and extended their application to Britain.
His background is relevant in that he is a conservative* (and himself a Christian, I think), worked for Bush, Sr., and is naturally a former supporter of George II. Like Buckley, I would have put Bush over Gore every time, and really don’t mind him being a Christian per se. But now it is turning out horrifically, and I wonder perhaps the chads would have been better falling the other way.
Praxis,
Amen. “Theocentric” is still, however, bad because we need governments that will accomodate themselves to human life, and operate in the light of reason. We cannot afford policy by revelation; no policy in a liberal state should ever be beyond question.
It is terrifically dangerous when rulers believe whatever they do is right, because they hold themselves to be good people with pure motives.
Patrick,
I fully agree that most of the best rulers in history were theists. So were most of the worst. It is a little difficult to make a comparison, between theists and atheists, since atheism has been for most of human history a position too unrespectable (indeed lethal) for a politician to hold openly, and attributed only by enemies.
The important thing about good rulers, whatever their private theological belief, is that they have generally regarded good government as a temporal, not a spiritual activity.
The Founding Fathers of the United States, for a hackneyed example, were not opposed to religion. They just didn’t regard imposing doctrine as a legitimate function of state. The third Marquess of Salisbury, the great Conservative hero, was a very fervent tractarian Anglican; but his regime never had a religiose flavour, and his chosen successor, his nephew Arthur Balfour, was a frank humanist.
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* I’m looking forward to his film Thank You for Smoking, publicity for which was the occasion of the interview I quote.
The Founding Fathers of the United States, for a hackneyed example, were not opposed to religion. They just didn’t regard imposing doctrine as a legitimate function of state.
Excuse me, but do you make a distinction between doctrine and morality? Bush doesn’t advertize his religion much, certainly less than Clinton did, for instance. But he does have a certain morality that follows from his beliefs, just as you do. I don’t find it strange that he should act accordingly, nor would I expect you to violate your own morality in similar circumstances.
Buckley’s problem, as far as I can see, is that he is a parochial east coaster who is unfamiliar with religious folk from the bible belt. Consequently they strike him as strange and threatening because they ain’t like him and don’t belong to those religious institutions that he is used to. I suspect he is rather sniffy about the whole Southern Babtist thing like many other irreligious members of the empty churches of the ancien regime are. That’s why I say he needs to get out more.
And, pray tell, what disasters do you see? The economy is perking along quite nicely, unemployment is low, and tax income is rising. Nor does the Iraq war strike me as a failure. Indeed, the most interesting war is the domestic war. That’s the war that must be won. PC and all sorts of socialist nonsense has been like a quiet disease eating away at the body politic. Now it has perforce made its presence known and the fight has been joined before the war was lost. Thank God for that, for there is a chance that it will begin to lose influence.
Theocentric [as applied to government]: having God as the central interest and ultimate concern.
Theocracy: government by immediate divine guidance, or by officials who are regarded as divinely guided.
Would the Pedant-General please advise on the practical differences.
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Guy wrote: we need governments that will accomodate themselves to human life, and operate in the light of reason. We cannot afford policy by revelation; no policy in a liberal state should ever be beyond question.
Definitely.
It is terrifically dangerous when rulers believe whatever they do is right, because they hold themselves to be good people with pure motives.
See below.
Guy wrote: I fully agree that most of the best rulers in history were theists. So were most of the worst.
In my lifetime, I judge the worst mainstream leaders to have been Hitler, Stalin and Mao. [And all of theists, nationalists and communists seem to feature amongst other recent bad ones.]
Perhaps the whole of history shows more bad theists than this. But modern government, if it cares at all for history, surely cares more about the recent than the distant past.
Guy wrote: The important thing about good rulers, whatever their private theological belief, is that they have generally regarded good government as a temporal, not a spiritual activity.
I’d prefer to view it that good rulers hold themselves truly accountable to higher authority (God, the people, etc), so accept that they can be wrong, and will answer for it when they are.
Despite the odd reservation above, I do think Guy is onto something useful, and that it has some application to the UK.
Best regards
The economy is perking along quite nicely, unemployment is low, and tax income is rising. Nor does the Iraq war strike me as a failure
I think this is what is known as “the soft bigotry of low expectations”. Real wages are falling, Bush has the worst record of job creation since the Great Depression, government spending is rising much more quickly than tax income, and if the Iraq war stikes you as a success, I very sincerely hope that not even my worst enemy has to live through what you would regard as a failure.
I think the discussion should be broadened to include the new “religions”, the main one being ECOTHEOLOGY which has its biggest influence, adherence and political enforcement of the doctrine (for it is truly a doctrine with little or no basis in rationality or science) on the European side of the pond.
As Michael Crighton so succintly put it, the new Global Warming Religion is a classic form of religion in that it has a fall from grace by the sin of mankind (greed and fossil fuels), and a salvation at the altar of “sustainability”. When you include this particular religion, then nowhere on earth is theocentricism more enforced by law and made the centre of government policy than in Europe.
Buckley’s comment sounds like hyperbole to me.
I wrote: In my lifetime, I judge the worst mainstream leaders to have been Hitler, Stalin and Mao.
Whoops.
Try: In my lifetime and that of those I know first-hand …
Apologies
Let’s not overlook the fact that a spanking majority of US voters knew perfectly well what the religious beliefs of Candidate Bush were – and voted for him, probably as much because of them as in spite of them.
Brits generally fail to understand that politicians in the US often have and espouse strong religious beliefs (President Clinton was always in church, it seems, Al Gore would bore you to death with his talk of ‘my faith traditions’, Senator Clinton (the politician formerly known as Hillary Rodham Clinton) lectures from the pulpit all the time) and yet this has absolutely zero impact on US laws, public policy or adminstration.
Expressed religious beliefs are a crude proxy that voters can use to gauge the social and moral positions of candidates on a wide variety of issues, and that candidates can use to influence voters’ opinions of them. Witness President Clinton appealling to his Southern Baptist roots after being caught in flagrante. But no more than that. A Southern Baptist? Wants you to think that he is pro-life, against gay marriage, for school choice, and so forth. An Episcopalian? Political shorthand for ‘I can shoehorn any necessary political position into the framework of my faith’, in other words, he can be, whatever you want him to be.
Mr Buckley is excessively concerned about this theocentrism in US public life, I’m sure he knows better, and I suspect that he’s playing to the gallery.
llater,
llamas
i think theres something wrong when someone in the 21st century says they belive in the literal truth of the bible. Its like refighting battles from the 17th and 18th century. We all know how much trouble can come from the literal translations of holy books.
I saw a documentry about a Christian College in Washington that was aiming to fill the halls of power with home schooled christian super bible bashers. Don’t get me wrong they were sincere, but in science lessons there biology teacher was convinced that the different geological layers weren’t laid down over millions of years but were deposited at different times during the great flood.
I don’t think i would want my country led by someone who even rometly thought that was possible.
i think the main problem with religious types is that they always seem to have strong views on how OTHER people should live there lives.
i think the main problem with religious types is that they always seem to have strong views on how OTHER people should live there lives.
If you think this attitude is exclusive to religious types, I suggest going to a meeting of your local environmentalist group.
You haven’t met many ‘religious types’ in that case. I know a few atheist types though and what you say certainly applies to them.
i think the main problem with religious types is that they always seem to have strong views on how OTHER people should live there lives.
That is, of course what defines a statist/ideologist/theocrat/environmentalist as opposed to a liberal individualist. “Religionistas” are but a small part of that whole tapestry of people happy to tell you how you should be living.
Jeez, Guy. You should have known better than to post religious criticism here, of all places.
Having said that, for the most part I agree with you.
I think this is what is known as “the soft bigotry of low expectations”. Real wages are falling, Bush has the worst record of job creation since the Great Depression, government spending is rising much more quickly than tax income, and if the Iraq war stikes you as a success, I very sincerely hope that not even my worst enemy has to live through what you would regard as a failure.
I think the meme of worst job creation record has been officially dead for a long time. Government spending can’t be rising faster than tax income if the deficit is falling while spending is growing.
As for the Iraq war, it would be a far kinder thing to wish this war upon your worst enemy, whatever its final status, than World War II.
We’ve learned that to hold up a placard saying
‘Behead the Enemies of Islam’
in front of millions of witnesses is not an offence because there is ‘no evidence’, in spite of the presence of two police officers within two feet of the poster.
So where’s the theocracy now?
More to the point, when is the liar and perjurer Blair (I) going to be prosecuted?
I think the meme of worst job creation record has been officially dead for a long time.
So, which president since Hoover do you claim has had a worse record of job creation?
Government spending can’t be rising faster than tax income if the deficit is falling while spending is growing.
There was a surplus when Bush took over. Last year there was a $318,000,000,000 deficit. That is what you call “falling”?
I’m getting a bit offgepissed with those who don’t seem to know the difference between ‘their’ & ‘there’ in their haste to see their wisdom in electronic print. Does none of them have a SpellChecker or use the preview button before proclaiming a lack of basic English? Is Dan Quale posting under a pseudonym?
And I worry about those who do not know the difference between spell checkers and (the less-widely available) syntax checkers.
Also, syntax checkers can be a pain of false alarms, for those who deal in sentences of any complexity. Though I must admit that I’ve not found one that mistakes their theres. That is except in contrived sentences and those involving discussion of linguistics.
On a more kindly note, please could we accept these occasional minor errors. Much worse things happen here.
Best regards
Sure, Nigel………………….didn’t mean to be pedantic and yes, there (not their) are worse things out there, like some of the commenters whose (not who’s) prose is almost as sloppy as their thoughts…..but I suppose it’s (not its) par for the times we live in………..innit?
Ironically, his father, WF Buckley wrote a book called Man and God at Yale which is considered by many to usher in the start of the religious right movement in politics.
I’m glad to hear that the apple fell far from the tree in that respect.
Felix,
“So, which president since Hoover do you claim has had a worse record of job creation?”
I am curious to know how you think a job gets created? How does a President create a job? AND how much lower than 4.7% unemployment do you expect any of your job creating presidents to achieve?
If you look at the Department of Labor statistics, Bush is far from the worst in job “creation”.
Yes Ann,
the apple did fall far from the tree in that W.F. Buckley at his son’s present age would not have made the same intellectually shallow and dishonest mistake his hapless son did.
As for the silly notion that GW’s religion is an issue, obviously the number of Americans who voted for him found that less of a concern than the mental instability of Al Gore, or the arrogant, vascillating weakness of John F-ing Kerry.
If you are uncomfortable with religion in government, perhaps you would be more comfortable with leaders who were actively hostile to religion? Like Pol Pot, Mao, Stalin, Lenin, Hitler, Castro, Caucescu, etc, ad. nauseum?
Could it be that it is no accident that the *Christian* based culture of the USA has a bearing on our stability and prosperity, while the athiestistic Euro governments seem only successful at eroding the freedoms and rights of their unhappy citizens?
If you look at the Department of Labor statistics, Bush is far from the worst in job “creation”.
You still haven’t answered the question. Which presidents had worse records on job creation?
BLS statistics? OK, here they are for gains in private employment for the first 5 years of each US president who was in office for at least 5 years, going back as far as the BLS statistics let me go (note that these are raw numbers, unadjusted for population):
Bush 924,000
Clinton 16,285,000
Reagan 7,190,000
Nixon 6,671,000
LBJ 9,355,000
Eisenhower 865,000
Truman 6,681,000
So if Bush is “far from worst”, which records are better? Eisenhower is your best bet, so if you want to argue that creating 865,000 private sector jobs when the population is 160 million is worse than creating 924,000 private sector job s when the population is 290 million, let’s hear the argument.
I am curious to know how you think a job gets created? How does a President create a job?
Economies create jobs. The president can affect the economy in myriad ways, such as having veto power of fiscal policy, etc.
AND how much lower than 4.7% unemployment do you expect any of your job creating presidents to achieve?
Here is a question for you. If everyone in the United States were fired, and the job market was so awful that none of them even looked for work for a month, what would the unemployment rate be?
The unemployment rate in that situation would, of course, be 0%. Would that number tell you anything meaningful about the employment situation?
As a second example, between June 2003 and June 2005, the unemployment rate fell from 6.3% to 5%, but the labor force participation rate remained around 15-year lows of 66%. What, then, was the unemployment rate telling us?
Felix
To begin with, which time series are you sourcing for your statistics?
As a Wharton-trained ex-economist from the US Treasury Department, whose job was to analyze historic time-series data from every government agency, I have to say I don’t understand this data you’ve presented as “job creation per president.”
First, statistics “from term start to term end” do not equal “job creation from a certain presidents’ policy” – neither statistically or causally. It may be politically convenient to equate the election or swearing-in date as the “start” of the impact of a new presidents’ policies, and the next president’s dates as the “end,” but that is not factually accurate.
Secondly, it begs the question of what is the proximate cause of job creation. And it is not sufficient to say “the economy.”
“Economy” obviously derives from the Greek, and the awareness that job creation comes from “economies” dates from at least the classical period. But to provide that as a sufficient answer reflects a level of knowledge that is “pre-economic” or “pre economic science.” Its like saying that biology creates health. All it says is that “somehow” this phenomenon called “the economy” is associated with job creation, and the political leaders “somehow” may affect that. It is, frankly, an “economic primitivist” point of view, to belief that answer answers anything.
Riddle me this: how does ONE job get created when there was no job before?
In addition, regarding your numbers and conclusions on “worst” records, I’m wondering if you’ve assumed that the buisness cycle has been abolished.
Unfortunately, there is no causal link or synchronization between the 4-year presidential election cycle and the business cycle. No newly-elected President is given a “blank slate” in terms of macro-trends, on taking office. Some presidents are handed severe challenges (which they meet or not) and others are handed recoveries (that they enhance or curtail).
I note as well that the duration of a presidency is not taken into account by your snapshot. The longer the term, the more likely the data will be skewed in favor of that president. Those who have longer terms than others (especially a factor in the 4-term Roosevelt period) have the benefit of escaping the skewing impact of arrivng at the head or tails of a single or 1.5 business cycles.
In a longer sample period, population growth and the offsetting effects of successive business cycles then take over numbers. The inherent robustness of the US economy then becomes what the presidency’s numbers largely report, not the specifics of their policies. It become even more the internal dynamics of their period, during a 2 or longer term presidency, that tell the often forgotten story of their policy impacts.
The exogenous factor (to a presidency) of the business cycle, as it derives from our form of monetary and political system, is not the “fault” or “credit” of any one president (altough policy trends over time can change the overall systemic profile).
Presidents take office before, after, or in the middle of downturn or recovery. They can hasten or prolongue a recovery if they inherit a downturn. A two-term president can start off inheriting a recovery, but be hit, at the end of their term, by the end of a boom they had been riding previously.
It is in this context that presidential policies have meaning – in fact, to the extent that policies lead to a fundamental changes in monetary and political system, presidents can actually impact the nature of our system (more or less interventionist) and thus prospects for better or worse business cycle swings in the future.
Only presidencies that see, at the hand of Congress or Presidential initiative (or both), major policy impacts on the structural form of government (imposition or removal of major involvements – ie., coercion – in the economic life of the citiizens), will have any actual impact on the longer term magnitude of the business cycle (or its existence in the first place).
Provided with this economic analytical framework (rather than a short-hand, crude assumption of correlation between data series per term and effectiveness at “job creation), I would like to point you to the best, most thorough analytical and statistical study of the Great Depression era ever done, by a first-hand witness, Benajmin M. Anderson.
In his ECONOMICS AND THE PUBLIC WELFARE, A FINANCIAL AND ECONOMIC HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES. 1914-1946, Anderson precisely studies the complex series of policies, starting from WWI, that led up to the Crash and the Depression – major, violent swings in the business cycle – and everything that happened during the New Deal to the close of WWII.
He studies the historic anomoly of the Depression, in which a downturn was prolongued unlike at any other time in modern history; why Hoovers’ policies (both in his administration and as a secretary in the previous), highly intereventionist in the economcy and worsening the trends set by Wilson, set the mechanism for the crash; and how Roosevelt’s “cures” uniquely acted to take an abrupt recession and deepen and lengthen it into a “depression.”
Lastly, he documents, in excruciating detail, how the liberalizing effects on industry of the war mobilization broke the freeze on economic readjustment that was the net effect of the New Deal.
Everything from a study of the increase in average age and stage of condition of capital equipment and tools during the New Deal, (historically worsened due to the elimination of profit and capital investment by policy), to the details of protectionist dislocations to the economy, Anderson covers it all. Ample blame is given to Hoover, though for reasons that would surprise you, and Roosevelt’s reputation as job-creator….is demolished. In detailed, fairly correlated, statistics.
Anderson documents, in a detailed cause-and-effect analysis, an economic history that most are unaware of and usually make easy, dogmatic assumptions about all the time.
Anderson provides the voluminous detail needed to understand what Roosevelt inherited in the business cycle, worsened before him by activists like Hoover, and made even worse by Roosevelt himself to the degree that he impeded the natural recovery mechanisms of the economy. The surpising story is that the 1914 ushered in a period of economic intervention and activism that continued and worsened through the 20’s, leading to Crash, and got even worse during the 30’s, leading to Depression.
In this context, the conclusion is clear: that the 30’s should have been a period of epic job creation, but was depressed (net job loss vs. population growth) until the policy changes of the war let normal recovery phase of the business cycle to finally emerge.
I note in conclusion and amusment of the Eisenhower boom portrayed in the way you have. Understanding the “heads-tails” impacts of choosing sample periods arbitrarly from the swearing in to swearing out of a president, no one who is thoroughly logical and fair and familiar with the data would conclude that the net job creation during the Eisenhower policy era (of which I am no great fan, but there have been worse) is as you assign in.
Coincidence (post hoc ergo propter hoc) is not causality. And the somewhat free US economy is still hard for even the worst policies to kill – which explains why it is easy for many presidents to claim that their policies were the medicine that made things better, when the truth is, that we grew or recovered despite their poison.
The criticism of Bush and job creation continues to get more parsed and more strained with each monthly report. While true that actual job creation totals are not particularly strong, it is one of the few statistics in the economy that is not. And of course it is improving steadily. Most people on the left would look back to 1996 rather longingly for the economic and employment situation, but the status of employment is about the same now as then.
Labor force participation rates are influenced by the number of people seeking work, the number of people who are discouraged from seeking work and the number of people entering the labor force (typically at age 16 or so) and the people permanently leaving the labor force through retirement. Our labor force participation rates are being deeply influenced by our aging population. Fewer people are entering the force as a percentage of the population and more are leaving through retirement. More are leaving because the population is aging and because they are able to retire due to enormous wealth gains over the past 25 years or so in the US economy.
The number of people seeking work and the number of people who are discouraged about finding work are shrinking and are below the numbers of 1996. The number of unfilled jobs in the economy is rising.
BLS numbers
(Unadj) Not in Labor Force, Want a Job Now (in thousands)
May numbers for each year
1994 7297
1995 6533
1996 6215
1997 5901
1998 5313
1999 5267
2000 5004
2001 5180
2002 5533
2003 5482
2004 5371
2005 5386
2006 5201
Disouraged Workers (in thousands)
also May numbers each year
1994 436
1995 398
1996 352
1997 338
1998 268
1999 256
2000 280
2001 328
2002 414
2003 482
2004 476
2005 392
2006 323
The job openings rate, the number of openings divided by employment plus job openings is rising also.
April Total US numbers ( May not available yet)
2001 2.8
2002 2.3
2003 1.3
2004 2.1
2005 2.6
2006 4.6 (preliminary) the March figure was 3.8
This statistic is only available beginning in ’01.
This suggests that employers are encountering difficulties in finding employees. The statistics do not support the idea that people are continuing to leave the workforce in droves because jobs are not available.
While true that actual job creation totals are not particularly strong, it is one of the few statistics in the economy that is not. And of course it is improving steadily.
It improved after the Bush recession as normally happens during a recovery. But even during the recorvery, job growth under Bush has almost always been too low to keep up with population growth. Best estimates are we need around 260,000 new jobs a month due to population growth. Bush has only managed that 4 months out of his two terms in office, and not once during the last 12 months, according to BLS data.
While true that actual job creation totals are not particularly strong, it is one of the few statistics in the economy that is not
I don’t believe this to be true, and neither does Brad DeLong:
Our labor force participation rates are being deeply influenced by our aging population. Fewer people are entering the force as a percentage of the population and more are leaving through retirement. More are leaving because the population is aging and because they are able to retire due to enormous wealth gains over the past 25 years or so in the US economy.
This is contrary to the numbers over the last 5 years. Here is a chart of labor force participation rate by age.
Notice that over the Bush administration’s term, labor force participation rates have gone up for older workers, and down for younger workers. This does not suggest that increasing retirement is a cause of low labor force participation rates. It suggests that the job growth in the economy has been low and that this is harming entry level workers the most.
Now it’s true that GDP growth and productivity growth are strong. And wages are going up for those who already make a lot of money. But none of that helps the median worker deal with rising energy and health-care costs or the decrease in the afforability of housing.
As I understand it there is a stark difference between the two forms of zealot above. An Environmentalist is concerned with the second-order external effects of what you do. A religious type is mainly concerned directly with what you do.
The world would probably be a better place if the two perspectives were to swap.
Notice that over the Bush administration’s term, labor force participation rates have gone up for older workers, and down for younger workers. This does not suggest that increasing retirement is a cause of low labor force participation rates.
What, you don’t think that there’s any chance that that suggests that an increasing percentage of 18-24 year olds are entering university and then graduate or professional school rather than entering the workforce?
Analyses of inequality that fail to consider the massive increase in education are inherently flawed. Considering that a person who goes to graduate or professional school tends to sacrifice some years to student poverty (perhaps parentally supported) in exchange for other years with a greater income, additonal education increases inequality for an individual over his life. Since different people in the economy are at different stages of life at any time, additional education, all things being equal, increases income inequality.
You claim that housing is less affordable, and yet home ownership rates continue to rise. (Though I certainly agree that in some markets the prices have risen what seems like too fast to me, and probably will fall.)
I don’t think that that is it at all. Both zealots are concerned by what you do. They merely have different, but equally irrational, motivations for that concern. Environmentalists, generally are really less concerned about the environment persé than about their hatred for mans place in it. Their misanthropy dominates. Environmentalists are the ultra puritans of today, totally unhappy that anyone anywhere might be happy.
In that way they are actually worse than the religious fanatics, who merely have the arrogance to make the unfounded assertion that their particular invented deity is the “right” and “only” deity. The religious are merely delusional. The environmentalists are feeding their delusion and trying to convert others with junk-science and trading on the (now nearly exhausted) good name of science, and converting governments into forcing their ecotheology on all the unbelievers as well.